OVO - final bill not yet sorted, moved 18th October

MrsBrush

We moved house on 18th October, we advised OVO of meter readings (Gas and Electric) and they told us we should have a final bill within a couple of weeks. Roll forward 6 weeks, to end November, and the final bill still hadn't been produced and a further direct debit was collected. We had originally owed them about £30, and the additional payment gave us a credit balance of £90. When I spoke to them, they confirmed that there had been a technical issue with the final bill, so they credited us a further £30 by way of compensation as it wasn't sorted in their 6 week window, and they cancelled the DD so no further payments can be collected. They said that the issue was being rectified and the final bill would be produced "imminently". However, here we are another month on, and we still don't have a final bill yet and I am unable to request the £120 credit balance from them via the website or app.

It doesn't help that the new house is supplied by the now defunct Bulb who seem to be making up random estimates on a daily basis and are asking for higher payments - we are on the SVR and payments are apparently at cap. Being fair, we are not totally sure of our 'normal' usage as we haven't been here long enough to really get a grip on this yet. Ideally I want the money back from OVO to buffer against any higher than expected payment increases from Bulb.

Whilst I understand that OVO have had an issue, how long should I wait till I get back in contact with them and making a fuss?

Thank you in advance.

FreeBear

MrsBrush said: It doesn't help that the new house is supplied by the now defunct Bulb who seem to be making up random estimates on a daily basis and are asking for higher payments - we are on the SVR and payments are apparently at cap. Being fair, we are not totally sure of our 'normal' usage as we haven't been here long enough to really get a grip on this yet.

Some of the energy comparison web sites scrape usage & supplier info from a central database - moneysupermarket.com is one, there are others you can use.. Handy for checking what neighbouring properties are using per year as well as your new home. But life style will have a big impact on your energy consumption.

MrsBrush

FreeBear said:

MrsBrush said: It doesn't help that the new house is supplied by the now defunct Bulb who seem to be making up random estimates on a daily basis and are asking for higher payments - we are on the SVR and payments are apparently at cap. Being fair, we are not totally sure of our 'normal' usage as we haven't been here long enough to really get a grip on this yet.

Some of the energy comparison web sites scrape usage & supplier info from a central database - moneysupermarket.com is one, there are others you can use.. Handy for checking what neighbouring properties are using per year as well as your new home. But life style will have a big impact on your energy consumption.

Thank you - good to know, but not sure how helpful this will be given our current heating system. We have an original 1972 gas hot air heating system, with the original boiler still limping along with an under-powered fan and without the hot water side working. Hot water is currently running from an electric immersion heater, and we are having to occasionally supplement the heating with a couple of oil filled electric radiators when the temperature drops significantly (I permanently work at home, so heating needed all day). I am pretty sure that this is an inefficient and expensive way of heating the house, and we will be replacing this whole system in the spring, when we finally figure out the best way forward. Everyone else in the street (all identical houses) have replaced the hot air system with conventional gas central heating, so may be useful for ongoing comparison.

wild666

MrsBrush said:

We moved house on 18th October, we advised OVO of meter readings (Gas and Electric) and they told us we should have a final bill within a couple of weeks. Roll forward 6 weeks, to end November, and the final bill still hadn't been produced and a further direct debit was collected. We had originally owed them about £30, and the additional payment gave us a credit balance of £90. When I spoke to them, they confirmed that there had been a technical issue with the final bill, so they credited us a further £30 by way of compensation as it wasn't sorted in their 6 week window, and they cancelled the DD so no further payments can be collected. They said that the issue was being rectified and the final bill would be produced "imminently". However, here we are another month on, and we still don't have a final bill yet and I am unable to request the £120 credit balance from them via the website or app.

It doesn't help that the new house is supplied by the now defunct Bulb who seem to be making up random estimates on a daily basis and are asking for higher payments - we are on the SVR and payments are apparently at cap. Being fair, we are not totally sure of our 'normal' usage as we haven't been here long enough to really get a grip on this yet. Ideally I want the money back from OVO to buffer against any higher than expected payment increases from Bulb.

Whilst I understand that OVO have had an issue, how long should I wait till I get back in contact with them and making a fuss?

Thank you in advance.

Take daily readings and put them into their billing part of their site every day. You would have taken an opening reading from the meter that is supplied by Bulb when you got the keys.
Do this every evening or morning first or last thing, I used to to that with them.

spiro

Write a letter of labelled complaint to OVO  because my understanding is they have to issue the final bill within 6 weeks especially as it's now been 10 weeks.

MrsBrush

Update - Ovo have responded to the letter, and are now manually processing the refund and account closure, so I should get the money back in the next 10 days. They have also opened a formal complaint.

Seems as though they wanted to do some checks as some of the readings over the last year were estimated... still cant figure out the problem, or why it has taken 10 weeks, as the final reading (with photo to show the readings and date/time) is surely the important one! All very strange, as their customer services have been brilliant from the outset, and they have been good in dealing with this (apart from the ridiculously long delay!)

CDarwin

MrsBrush said:

We moved house on 18th October, we advised OVO of meter readings (Gas and Electric) and they told us we should have a final bill within a couple of weeks. Roll forward 6 weeks, to end November, and the final bill still hadn't been produced and a further direct debit was collected. We had originally owed them about £30, and the additional payment gave us a credit balance of £90. When I spoke to them, they confirmed that there had been a technical issue with the final bill, so they credited us a further £30 by way of compensation as it wasn't sorted in their 6 week window, and they cancelled the DD so no further payments can be collected. They said that the issue was being rectified and the final bill would be produced "imminently". However, here we are another month on, and we still don't have a final bill yet and I am unable to request the £120 credit balance from them via the website or app.

It doesn't help that the new house is supplied by the now defunct Bulb who seem to be making up random estimates on a daily basis and are asking for higher payments - we are on the SVR and payments are apparently at cap. Being fair, we are not totally sure of our 'normal' usage as we haven't been here long enough to really get a grip on this yet. Ideally I want the money back from OVO to buffer against any higher than expected payment increases from Bulb.

Whilst I understand that OVO have had an issue, how long should I wait till I get back in contact with them and making a fuss?

Thank you in advance.

I have exactly the same problem. When I moved out on 22nd October they said the £400+ credit balance would be repaid. They gave me £30 when they breached their 6 week rule. It’s now 8th February and they’re still unable to calculate my final bill.

I got them to pay me £300 but they insisted on hanging on to the last £128 in case I owed them anything (I don’t, as they still took my final payment at the beginning of November). 

So, they were able to raise bills all the way up to the point where they owed me money, then they had a technical problem that they don’t have the resources to fix (maybe they shouldn’t be cutting 1700 jobs?)

Customer service guy said that they were dealing with “quite a few” of these cases, but had no timeline for when they would repay me. 

How many people have this issue? How much cash is Ovo sitting on?

MrsBrush

We eventually got our money back from Ovo in Mid-January - they said they needed to check we didn't owe them any more and they were checking all our meter readings over the last year... though that was a slightly bonkers bit of reasoning as the final moving out meter readings would have allowed them to rectify this, one would think! I think personally that the 1700 job cuts are more to do with it!

So all sorted, but still stuck with the charlatans at Bulb as we cant switch!